Technicolor CineStyle Color Assist Tutorial w CS6

Here’s a quick follow up to yesterday’s post for those who want to see the Technicolor CineStyle Color Assist workflow in action with Adobe Premiere CS6. You can see how well integrated this workflow is in Premiere CS6 and how easy it would be to integrate this with your existing workflow, or with a DP on set setting initial looks for their editor/colorist. The beauty of this is that you can send the small sidecar .XCSL file via e-mail which makes this very attractive for people constantly on the move.

I didnt like, Red Giant Photo Looks 2, is far more complete, a comparation is even not fair, this program is first generation and doesnt shows nothing more than basic. Why sould I choose this one instead PhotoLooks?

Because it has a very different use that Magic Bullet. I actually see the two as complimenting one another and at a different points of your workflow – neither is meant to replace one another, just as Magic Bullet and CineStyle Color Assist are not meant to replace DaVinci Resolve…. Allow me to do a demo of how I think this can be used – in about 1-2 weeks as I am travelling – fair enough?

considering the limitations of the Canon DSLR codec, there’s plenty of professionals who prefer to NOT shoot flat, but to try to get the look in-camera as much as possible.
mainly becos the leeway with this codec isn’t that big to begin with, and starting with a flat image and adding extensive grading may lead to all kinds of side effects, banding, weird skin tones, .. etcetera.
Shane Hurlbut and the people from stillmotion are just 2 that come to mind. I’m with them.

Shooting flat is a great idea when using a Canon C300 or one of the Sony FS series, maybe even with the new 5DMkIII (since it has a different codec), but for every camera with H264 compression it’s probably more a bad than a good idea.

I have said this a few times: The in camera CineStyle profile can be a really excellent tool that gets you results you could never get with the Canon built-in profiles. HOWEVER – I agree w/ Shane and others that in certain circumstance – notable overcast or muddy light – it can yield some unwanted results notably with skin color. In the end know the limitations of all your tools – in this case this is definitely one of them. Note that using the CineStyle look is not necessary in order to use this software though.

Had a look at the trial just now, and it is a good deal for 99, but not really very earth shattering.

If one lacks the commitment to learn a grading system properly, then they will certainly tend to be the kind of person who is satisfied slapping a pre-made look on a piece of footage.

Last thing we need is another 50000 clips that all look the same clogging the ether.

And no, recent NYU grad and subsidized Williamsburg resident, your masterpiece doesn’t look like Moonrise Kingdom just because you clicked that preset you just downloaded from the same blog everyone else did.

Vincent, you took time to learn your craft, and did so well. Please don’t promote this kind of easy path.

Unless, of course, technicolor are giving you a commission. If that’s the case, please carry on.

Jonny I hate to say it but you come off like a total snob. Have you actually tried the app? It’s pretty powerful for what it portends to do. It’s NOT trying to replace a full-fledge grading system. If Apple has taught us anything it’s that NOT everyone needs high end NLEs or Photoshop… and that’s fine.

I am considering to buy the Technicolor Color Assist software. However, in their codec section, it does NOT seem to indicate that it can process XF (MPEG-2) codec that Canon C300 uses. Do we have to transcode it into ProRes in order to use Color Assist? Also, since Color Assist can serve as a plug-in for Premiere Pro CS6, which takes FX codec, how does it work if Color Assist does not support XF?

You are correct the Color Assist software does NOT currently support the XF codec. It should work in Premiere however but you won’t be able to go back to Color Assist – so yes you should transcode at this point. I know they’re working on all of these issues continually at Technicolor.

I have just graded a premiere pro cs 5.5 project using the Cine style color assist programme I purchased two days ago. I was just about to export it when premiere crashed. It seems the thunderbolt HD I was using that has my (unbacked up) mov files, and the premiere project is the problem. I saved a version of the project onto my mac desktop, but premiere cannot access the files to reboot the project as they are on the crashed harddrive. I still have my Color Assist programme opened on the desktop with all the colour passes I used on the edit. I can´t eject the thunderbolt harddrive because Color assist is using it. Will I lose my color assist files if I attempt to eject the HD or shut down my laptop? Can I access the xcsl files from the programme directly (rather than the harddrive)? Many thanks for any and all suggestions…

I have found an issue with the Premiere Pro plugin and Color Assist around media management. If you rename your media directory, your grades will no longer be available. Also if you backup your project using the project manager, PP will refer to the original location for the sidecar file. In this video I demonstrate the issue and show a simple workaround.http://youtu.be/0-RBLoUaK7I